Did I tell you about the apartment?

Oh yes, I think I forgot to really tell you about the apartment we're staying in. It's a 4-Star facility with exceptional service. But did I tell you that it takes 85 stairs and 8 landings to reach our front door.  You really don't want to forget anything once you leave in the morning -- it's a hell of a hike to get back.  But the service staff seems to do it with ease.  Daily maid service brings in fresh linens and towels daily, fully cleans, and seem to manage with smiles on their faces.  I have trouble smiling until after I can catch my breath.

The apartment is dated, but then everything in London seems dated. I think the building is 19th century, and the apartments have been updated to post WWII. The baths and kitchen are very new and adequate. There's even a washing machine in the kitchen,but no dryer. We're drying damp clothes on the radiators (which have also been recently updated).  I would definitely stay here again, but would plead for an apartment on a lower floor.

Oct 23 Tuesday - Westminster Abbey

Today I joyfully slept in to 7:30am. Vasilis had left for his office of course, but then I'm not sure when he sleeps. Carolyn was getting dressed, Philip was sound asleep, and Donna made it to 9:00am. By the time we finished breakfast and got out of the apartment it was nearly 10:30am.  We walked the two blocks to the bus stop heading to China Town to buy tickets for Singing' In the Rain at the Palace Theater box office.  We wanted tickets in the 40 pound range, which according to the seating chart at the box office would place us in the rear of upper balcony. The ticket agent however offered us main floor, 11th row center seats for 40 pounds each. That was about 40% less than the listed price, but as we later learned, most of the theater in London is discounted at third party ticket offices. I was surprised that discounted tickets were offered at the box office as well, especially as we are two days from the performance.

 

 

Philip wanted to see the street performers at Covent Garden which was a short walk from the Palace Theater. We entered the Market just as a street magician was preforming a straight jacket, chain and rope escape.  After wandering around the market for half an hour we ate lunch at Union Jacks, a Jamie Oliver restaurant.  As I would expect from Jamie, the offerings were excellent. I had a tandori chicken and Donna had grilled salmon.  We watched a unicycle artist just before leaving Covent Garden for a walk along the Strand to the Parliament Buildings, Big Ben and Westminster Abbey.

 

Along the Strand we saw the large ferris wheel called the London Eye. I believe a similar ferris wheel is being constructed in Seattle. We arrived at the Abbey entrance at 3:00 pm just 30 minutes before the last entry of the day. They charge a hefty fee for visitors, 16 pounds (about $27) which includes an audio tour of the Abbey. They gave Philip a four page quiz to complete which was rewarded with a chocolate coin at the gift shop. I could hardly find the answers to the questions and we gave up after page two. 

 

The Abbey is truly amazing, having been started over 1,000 years ago, although it wasn't until the 13th cnetury that the current architecture was established and building continued for several hundred years. Pictures were not permitted, so I have nothing visual to share.  Sorry.

 We caught a bus back to Sloane Square whcih left us off almost directly in front of our apartment. Vasilis picked up Philip to have dinner with his friend, and Donna and I went back to Al-Dar, the Lebanese restaurant a few blocks away that we ate at our first night here.  We tried several nearby French restaurants, but all were booked. This area is loaded with restaurants, many that we would love to try but know we won't have the opportunity (this trip).

 

 



Oct 22 Monday - British Museum

Monday, Oct 22nd

We decided on the British Museum for our day's adventure, and after having breakfast at the apartment walked the two blocks to the train station to buy an "Oyster" card, a discounted travel pass good for buses and trains throughout London. We boarded the number 19 bus, one of the ubiquitous double deckers, that took us right to the museum. As we left well after rush hour, we had most of the bus to ourselves for the first several stops. Philip immediately ran upstairs for the great views it afforded. It was a fun ride.

The Museum is overwhelming in scope, and we decided to start with ancient Greece as that is Philip's heritage through his father. To get to the Greek rooms we passed through ancient Egypt with an amazing statue of Ramses II gazing down with a watchful eye on all those passing beneath. We rented personal multi-media players that provided commentary as well as video support throughout the museum on hundreds of exhibited elements. A real step up from the typical audio players we're all used to.

I don't know about you, but there is only so much a person can take of a museum, even one as bountiful as the British. Two hours of wandering through was about all we could take. We found the restaurant on the third floor at 12:30pm and had an unexpected excellent meal. I had artic char, Donna had broiled sardines (really good), and Philip had spaghetti with tomato sauce. He ended up eating half my artic char as well.  For dessert he had an adult sized portion of chocolate pie with a large scoop of salted caramel ice cream. I could hardly believe he consumed the entire thing. I know it was good, but based solely on a few crumbs he missed.

At lunch we read that the Rosetta Stone was in the museum and began a quest to find it. Seems we walked right past it when we first entered the very first room (Ancient Egypt) on our way to Ancient Greece.  While the room was empty in the morning, there was such a crowd around the Rosetta Stone we could hardly see it.  I gave Philip my camera and sent him to push his way to the front to take a picture. He did a great job as I hope you will agree. It is an amazing artifact with such clearly defined writing, it is difficult to believe it was created so many thousands of years ago.

We decided to leave immediately after that, about 2:45pm. We had hoped to see Westminster Abbey on the way back, but we were all very tired, and the Abbey closes for tours at 3:30pm. We hopped on the number 19 for the ride back on a totally empty bus for the first few stops. We saw the theater showing Singin' in the Rain and decided that we should see if we could get tickets for it before we left London.

We got off the bus in Chelsea, a few stops before Sloane Square, to walk past the couture stores. If I were to live in London, this is certainly where I would want to be. Unfortunately, a two bedroom, two bath apartment costs about 1.3 million pounds sterling based on the posings we saw in several real estate office windows.

Carolyn made it back from work at 5:15pm and we had dinner together at a local pizza restaurant. Carolyn and I shared a goat cheese and carmelized onion Rome style pizza and a salade Nicoise.  Not the best pizza I've ever had (that disticntion goes to the one I had in Rome back in May), but really good.

Stopping for gelato and a little grocery shopping on the walk home (Vasilis suprised us by showing up from work at the grocery store), we ended our day planning on what we would do tomorrow. It;s only a day away.

Oct 21 Sunday - Soccer

We all slept pretty well and began our day about 8:00am.  Vasilis and I went to get coffee at a local Starbucks, but when we arrived we found it was no longer at that location. We hopped a cab and went to another a few miles away. By the time we got back to the apartment, it was after 9:00am and Vasilis and Philip had to leave for a morning youth soccer game. Vasilis has a friend in London who picked them up for the game. After breakfast, Donna, Carolyn and I walked to the park to watch them play. Philip was amazing, scored two goals, and ended up getting a gold medal for the best player on the team that day. It was pretty obvious watching him -- he seemed to be everywhere, and his ball control was nothing short of amazing.

Vasilis friend Stephano invited us all to his house nearby.  It's a lovely fully restored row house, in a very upscale part of London (Pimlico).  The cost of homes in London is truly outrageous.  A 200 sq. meter house on his street just went on the market for 2.7 million streling or about $4.5 million US. That's for an 2,150 sq. ft. house, no garage, and no yard. I've included a few pictures from his house which is just fully remodeled and absolutely lovely. Stephano's home is 1,600 sq. ft. and like all the homes in the area has a single room on each floor, with a kitchen and laundry below street level, a family room at street level, and bedrooms on the next two levels.





We've spent most of the day and arrived back at the apartment about 4:00pm.  Tomorrow Carolyn and Vasilis have to go to their offices so we have the day with Philip.  We'll plan our day this evening and I'll share it all with you in tomorrow's blog.

Arrival - Oct 20th Saturday

Saturday, October 20th

Good morning -- or as we say in the UK, good afternoon. While sleep was considered a bonus, after getting only three hours (and not such great sleep hours to boot), I can honestly say that its not a bonus -- its critical and sorely missed.  Our plane touched down at Heathrow at 12:15pm, pretty much right on time. We would have been even earlier had traffic control not placed us in a holding pattern for a half hour, about 10-min from the airport.

Baggage was pretty quick, and there was almost no one at immigration and absolutely no one at customs. Unfortunately, there was no one at the greeting gate with our name on it to identify our driver into London. After calling the car service, I learned that they had instructed the driver to pick us up at Terminal 1.  Unfortunately, we were at Terminal 4.  Our driver was so overly apologetic that I felt more sorry for him than us.

The drive into London took nearly 40-minutes despite the times we were traveling at speeds that an Apollo Mission might envy.

We arrived at the Sloane Club and received our apartment keys. Their staff would deliver our luggage about 15-minutes later, and good thing at that.  Unit 12 in House 4 on Sloane Street, Chelsea is a fifth story walk-up. The rooms are neat and clean and well appointed but dated. Carolyn and Vasilis have the twin bedroom, Philip has a fold up bed in the living room, and Donna and I the master suit.  Pretty funky, but with two baths and such a great location, we'll likely be quite happy here.

We walked around the Chelsea area until Carolyn, Vasilis and Philip returned from the Soccer Game they attended.While out, we found a Saturday market where we bought a loaf of bread. The market was in Duke of York Square where we discovered Partridges, a lovely local grocery store and stocked up on some basics for breakfast.  We met the kids at the apartment and went out to dinner at a neighborhood Mediterranean restaurant. I'll grab the camera and will post again when I have fresh eyes and a fresh mind on tomorrow/s schedule.

Departure - Oct 19th Friday

Friday, October 19, 2012

As happens with every trip you plan, the day eventually comes when the journey begins. Today is that day.  While I had wished to fly non-stop from Seattle to London, just couldn’t find a flight that worked for us.  In the end, I decided on Delta.  I’m loyal and have just about all my frequent flier miles on them. And while I would have preferred to fly British Air, the cost difference between BA and Delta made my decision pretty easy.

So here we are, 35-40 thousand feet on our way to London in a Boeing 767-400 that departed Minneapolis about two hours ago. The trip from Seattle to Minneapolis was on time, comfortable and uneventful. We had an hour connection to our London flight, but the arrival gate for the Seattle flight was in the same “G” concourse as our London flight.

Minneapolis Airport has some pretty terrific restaurants. We discovered one next to our departure gate that has a very futuristic theme with Ipads at every table, no cash accepted (credit cards only), and the menu a self-select and order on the Ipad.  We ordered two Salad Nicoise and a beet salad to go, that arrived just as our flight began to board.  Glad we did as the selection on the flight was as you would expect.

Seats are comfy and I’m hoping to get some sleep. The flight time is just under 8-hours and we’re two hours into it.  I’m not too hopeful of a good night’s sleep, but Donna has her eyeshades on, her ear plugs in, and wishing herself to sleep. I’ll let you know how it worked out when we land on Saturday.

Goodnight for now.

Getting Ready for London & Amsterdam

We're less than a week away from our departure this Friday for London. We're scheduled to arrive on Saturday, October 20th for seven nights at the Sloan Club in Chelsea, then on to Amsterdam on the 27th for four nights before returning to Seattle on the 31st.  We'll be staying at the Hotel Estherea in Amsterdam.  Our phone contacts while there are UK cell phone numbers -- 011-44-793-708-5991 for me and 011-44-793-706-0179 for Donna. I'll be checking my email regularly - jayh.solomon@gmail.com - which is the best way to stay in touch for both of us.

We'll be meeting up with Carolyn, Vasilis and Philip who will be staying with us in a two bedroom apartment, part of the Sloan Club properties.  We're able to stay there through our Washington Athletic Club membership, both clubs belonging to the same affiliated group allowing reciprocal privleges.

As always, I'll do my best to keep up with daily postings and photos from our visit.